Avs will always have shot at crown

CERTAINTIES: DEATH, TAXES, Avs in the playoffs. Since relocating to Colorado in 1995, the Avalanche have always made the playoffs — nine times in nine years; they’ve won the division eight of those years and played in six Western Conference finals while winning two Stanley Cups.

The Avs always contend. They always have, and even with the NHL’s new do, they always will. They’ll contend this year despite one of the most disturbing offseasons in team history.

For the first time in Colorado’s short history, the Avs are without Adam Foote, one of the NHL’s top defensemen who now skates for Columbus after signing a deal on Aug. 2. Along side weathered veteran and seven-time NHL All-Star Rob Blake, Foote was part of one of the greatest defensive lines in NHL history. If breaking up the Foote-Blake machine wasn’t devastating enough, the new salary cap let loose a real heartbreaker only one day later when Colorado could no longer afford its best player, Peter Forsberg.

Forsberg spilt ways with Colorado for a more lucrative offer in Philadelphia — the Avs just couldn’t afford him. If the loss of Forsberg wasn’t enough, Paul Kariya and Teemu Selanne, two hailed All-Star free agents who took pay cuts to play with Colorado, jumped ship shortly after Foote and Forsberg.

It’s easy for Avalanche fans to access the team’s losses and say that they won’t make it this year. But, dramatic as those losses sound — Foote, Forsberg, Kariya, Selanne — there’s nothing to worry about.

Forsberg missed 43 games last year, more than half of the season, and the Avs have gotten used to winning games without him. To fill the hole left by Forsberg’s departure, the Avs brought in Pierre Turgeon, a No. 1 pick in 1987 that scored 15 goals and assisted 25 more with Dallas last year. He’s no Forsberg, but he’ll do.

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Foote, a pillar in Colorado’s defense, is replaced by the very capable Patrice Brisebois, who accumulated 31 points with Montreal in 2004, one more point than Foote had with Colorado.

And Kariya and Selanne never amounted to much in Colorado anyway. Together they combined for just 68 points, far below their production in 2003 when they put up 145.

The consolation prizes — Turgeon and Brisebois — are nice, but just by looking at the hand the Avs still hold, the picture gets a lot rosier.

Colorado still owns Joe Sakic, probably the most natural scorer left in the game; Milan Hejduk, another scoring threat that hasn’t missed a game in the last two unlocked out seasons. Alex Tanguay had a career-best 54 assists in 2004, and David Aebischer is only the second goalie in franchise history to win 30 or more games in one season. Aebischer did so in only his first year as a full-time starter, and he did it with the sixth-best save percentage in the league.

The Avs will be all right.

So will the Avs contend for the Cup this season? They always do, and this year won’t be any different. Winning it, especially in the parity of salary-cap era, that’s going to be a little trickier.